


Small Town Life

by jenna_thorn



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-05
Updated: 2016-01-05
Packaged: 2018-05-12 05:44:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5654572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenna_thorn/pseuds/jenna_thorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"When you say meds, what meds do you mean?” Nat blinked. It took a while. Laura narrowed her eyes. “Can you actually feel your toes right now?”</p><p>There was a long pause before Natasha said, “How often do you really <i>need</i> to feel toes?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Small Town Life

**Author's Note:**

  * For [james](https://archiveofourown.org/users/james/gifts).



Laura walked into the room but neither of them glanced up from apparently, a staring contest. She propped the laundry basket onto one hip and waved her freed hand between them. “Right, okay, welcome home the both of you and holy shit, are you okay?” she asked as Natasha swayed, then stepped back, then again to lean against the wall. It looked like a kid trying to be James Dean and was wholly, completely, unlike her natural grace. 

Laura looked to Clint, who said, “She’s on meds, we gotta, I mean, I gotta –“

Natasha turned her head to let her hair fall over her face and Laura recognized the gesture. She turned to Clint and poked him in the chest with a fingernail. “You gotta fix the bathroom sink, because the last time I got Jay Perkins out here, you had a jealous fit, and –“

“I have eyes!”

“And he’s got a nice ass, but more importantly, he’s got a crescent wrench and if you get called away mid project, I can put the lids back on the paint cans, but I need a functioning sink, so if you don’t finish it, I’m going to find someone who can. That’s Perkins.”

“So finish it, Barton,” Nat said, and Laura thought for a moment that she was imagining a cruel edge to her voice.

Laura dropped the basket to the floor then stood with her hands uselessly empty, because Natasha had straightened, out of her reach. “See, she’s on my side.”

Clint’s mouth narrowed. “No, she’s just not on mine.”

Laura wondered what she’d stumbled into. “And we’re going into town.”

Nat looked up, and said, “Ah, no.”

“You want to stay here while he swears at hundred year old plumbing?”

“I, ah, I don’t do town.”

“You don’t stutter, either. When you say meds, what meds do you mean?” Nat blinked. It took a while. Laura narrowed her eyes. “Can you actually feel your toes right now?”

There was a long pause before Natasha said, “How often do you really _need_ to feel toes?”

“Oh god, should you even be out of bed?”

“I need to move around. The nurses were making me do laps around the ward. It got boring.”

“So’s town, but the view’ll be different on each lap, and I can leave you in the truck when you get tired. Clint, help me carry that upstairs, please.”

She waited on the landing for him and he ran into her back with the basket before moving it to his side and curling his arm around her ribs. Laura put her hands around his waist and he leaned in, dropping his mouth to the side of her neck and kissing her just below her ear. He might have meant it as a comfort for her, but if it worked for the both of them, that was okay, too. “What happened?”

“I..uh …We were, uh …. Man, where to start.”

“You two were off swinging from rooftops, she got injured …” Laura pulled back a bit to look into his eyes. “She got injured as a direct or indirect result of something you did which is why you feel guilty and you’re hovering the way you won’t let me do.”

“Indirect. I took a guy out, so he missed his mark and hit her.”

“Please don’t tell me you were the target he missed.”

“Okay.”

She waited a beat, then let her head fall against his chest. “I know better than to ask.”

“I’m just impressed that you figured all of it out.”

“I don’t need to know where you were to figure out where you are.”

“Also, I’m not hovering,” he added, staring into the laundry basket as though the folded towels there would believe him.

She laughed until he huffed, then laughed more. “Yeah, do you even hear the words in your mouth? Okay, here’s how we’re going to do this. You’re going to stay here and make up the guest bed and the kids are going to help you. Then put her down for her nap, help him with math, then bathroom sink. We’ll be back in two hours. Did the docs give instructions? I’m assuming no booze, if she’s on painkillers …”

“You don’t have to do this, Laura.”

“ _It is not good that Man should be alone; I will make him a helpmate, his like._ ” She watched him furrow his brow and cut off whatever he was trying to figure out how to say. “Think of it as communal property and goals. We’re a team, right? _From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs._ ” 

“Yeah.”

“This is why my aunts don’t like you, you know. Marx you get, but Genesis throws you.”

“Your aunts don’t like me because of the way we met.”

“Good thing you didn’t marry one of them, then. Or my asshole brother. Medical directives?”

“Try to get her to drink water, she needs to walk around, but can’t carry anything. If you can wear her out enough to sleep, that’d be good.”

He kissed her forehead, as he always did, and headed to the linen cabinet. She headed through the kitchen first to make sure the kids were still drawing on paper at the table and not each other or the walls or drinking every juice box within reach, again, then grabbed her purse, two bottles of water, and the grocery list, and drew short at the door. There was no femme fatale leaning in the doorway, or sitting on the hall tree, or on the ugly over-upholstered chaise that Clint so loved in the parlor. She pushed open the screen door to find Natasha in the rocking chair on the porch. 

“Upsy daisy, we’re headed into town. Which, before you say no, may I remind you is away from him. I know he’s driving you crazy, because I recognize the look in your eyes from my own mirror. Do you need a hand?” Natasha inhaled, put both palms on the arms of the rocking chair, and rose gracefully to her feet, then exhaled. Laura pulled back her hand. Natasha swayed and Laura stuck her hand out again. “Just down the stairs, then you can John Wayne it out, tough guy.” 

They made it to the truck and Laura blessed her insistence on the modified suspension. She didn’t help Natasha in, just opened the door and stood behind her, but she didn’t miss that Natasha actually used the running board this time and settled into the padded bench seat with a slow slouch. 

She sat behind the wheel with her hand on the key and said, “Oil rig.”

“Beg pardon?”

“The official story is that Clint works on the rigs off the Louisiana coast. Explains the absences and injuries. Well, sort of.”

“Ah, cover story, yes, and who am I?”

“You’re my sister in law. Truth is easier than lies anyway.” Laura kept her eyes ahead more carefully than the familiar view of the side of the barn warranted. 

“That’s … that’s good.”

Laura shifted into gear and let off the clutch a little more carefully than usual. She didn’t miss the slow easing in the woman beside her.


End file.
